Brand Buddha starts tenth year with faded lustre

By Sirshendu Panth and Soudhriti Bhabani, Kolkata, Nov 6 : Amid the boom of Maoist guns, raging political violence and speculation on whether the end is in sight for the 32-year Left Front (LF) government, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee Friday stepped into his tenth year as West Bengal chief minister.

Having taken over the reins from the iconic Jyoti Basu on Nov 6, 2000, Communist Party of India-Marxist's (CPI-M) top gun Bhattacharjee led the Left combine to definitive wins in the state assembly polls in 2001 and 2006. But three-and-a-half years after the last poll, the tide seems to have turned.

Bhattacharjee now presides over an administration that is often accused of chickening out from taking hard decisions, especially after the opposition's recent electoral victories.

While the CPI-M-led Left Front still enjoys a massive mandate in the assembly, the string of losses in the panchayat, municipal, Lok Sabha elections and even by-polls have raised serious questions about its prospects in the assembly elections due in May 2011.

The electoral resurgence of the Trinamool Congress-led opposition has also triggered fierce blood-soaked turf battles in several districts with the violence between the two groups claiming more than 100 lives over the past six months.

Trinamool Congress chief and Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee and her associates, clamouring for president's rule in the state, have complained about CPI-M atrocities, prompting union Home Minister P. Chidambaram to ask Bhattacharjee to maintain law and order "whatever be the provocation".

Bhattacharjee also has to deal with the upsurge of Maoist violence that has put the state in the national terror map.

Maoist rebels are challenging the writ of the state in at least 18 police station areas of the three western districts of Purulia, West Midnapore and Bankura. When the ultras virtually established a free zone in West Midnapore's Lalgarh belt, Bhattacharjee's government launched a massive security operation with central and state security forces.

Though the forces have reclaimed areas from the Maoists, the rebels still manage to kill and abduct policemen and CPI-M cadres and tribals opposed to them.

In the north, the picturesque Darjeeling hills are virtually under the control of the Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM), fighting for establishing a separate Gorkhaland state out of parts of West Bengal.

The mantra of massive industrialisation, which made Bhattacharjee the darling of a vast section of the middle classes and contributed to the LF's successes in the 2001 and 2006 assembly polls, seems to have faded too.

With the opposition winning over a large number of peasants, for long a LF votebank, by launching sustained and often-violent campaigns against the acquisition of farmland for industries, a shaky administration is loathe to take any decisions on projects that require large chunks of land.

The outcome was there for all to see.

Tata Motors withdrew its small car project from Singur. And the government was also forced to pull out of Nandigram, where it was hoping to set up a chemical hub with Indonesia's Salim group, following police firing on peasants and opposition activists on March 14, 2007.

The death of 14 people that day and the resultant backlash dealt a blow to the administration's ability to implement hard and unpopular decisions needed in the long-term interests of the state.

Apart from entrepreneurial ventures, even infrastructure projects like the construction of highways and power plants have been stalled on the land issue.

Bhattacharjee - often compared to reformist Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping for his reformist economic policies and 'do it now' slogan - has been trying to reverse the downward curve by identifying the deficiencies in the administration.

The dhoti clad Bengali 'Bhadralok' now takes weekend trips to the districts and holds daily meetings with district leaders to ensure that government initiatives percolate down. Based on the inputs, he directs bureaucrats to fine-tune the mechanism to benefit the masses "irrespective of party colour".

It remains to be seen if Brand Buddha -- once hailed as the prime reason for making the state a happening investment destination for global corporate honchos -- regains its lustre and succeeds in reviving the LF's fortunes.